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Saudi state terrorism leaves 21.2 million Yemenis—82% of population—in need of humanitarian assistance

Between mid-March, when fighting escalated, and the second week of October, health facilities had reported 32,307 casualties (including 5,604 deaths), or an average of 153 injuries or deaths each and every day.

21.2 million, or 82% of the population are in need of humanitarian assistance.

3 million people now require treatment or preventive services for malnutrition.

2 million are currently acutely malnourished, including 1.3 million children – 320,000 of whom are suffering from severe acute malnutrition.

“More than seven months of conflict have severely exacerbated Yemen’s prior large-scale humanitarian emergency. Partners currently estimate that 21.2 million people require assistance – an increase of one-third since the crisis began in mid-March 2015. Major increases in need have occurred since the June 2015 Humanitarian Needs Overview in key sectors, including food security, nutrition and shelter. Displacement and human rights violations have also risen considerably.”

19.3 million lack adequate access to clean water or sanitation

14.1 million people lack sufficient access to healthcare

1.8 million children have been out of school since mid-March.

Solid waste removal has come to a halt in several areas.

Three in four Yemenis are unable to meet their basic wash needs.

Public services are rapidly failing “due to direct impact of conflict and insufficient resources to pay salaries or maintain services,” said the report.

“Since 26 March, health facilities have reported more than 32,200 casualties – many of them civilians. In the same period, has verified 8,875 reports of human rights violations – an average of 43 violations every day. Verified incidents of child death or injury from March to September are almost five times higher than 2014 totals.”

Displacement

About 2.3 million are currently displaced within Yemen and 121,000 others have fled the country.

“Displacement has contributed to rises in needs across sectors – particularly shelter and NFIs, for which about 2.8 million IDPs and host community members currently require support.”

Updated

More than 432,000 refugees, migrants arrive in Europe by sea since January, with 2,748 recorded fatalities

An estimated 432,761 asylum-seeking refugees and migrants have reached Europe by sea in 2015 so far this year (as of September 10, 2015), reported the International Organization for Migration (IOM). “This figure is double the amount of arrivals in the Mediterranean for the entire 2014, emphasizing the scale of the current migration emergency.”

About 70% of the arrivals were registered in Greece (309,356 people), and 28% in Italy (121,139 people). At least 2,748 migrants have lost their lives in the Mediterranean Sea (year to September 10), while 2,223 migrant deaths were recorded in 2014, according to Missing Migrants*.

Greece, the largest arrival portal, registered about 246,000 people: over 70% came from Syria alone (175,375), while the other main countries of origin were Afghanistan (50,177), Pakistan (11,289), and Iraq (9,059) between January 1 and August 31. (Additionally, more than 50,000 migrants and refugees have arrived in Greece since the beginning of September, IOM estimates).

Italy recorded 116,149 arrivals during the same period—a 3% increase compared with last year—with the bulk of refugees and migrants coming from Eritrea (30,708), Nigeria (15,113), Somalia (8,790), Sudan (7,126), Syria (6,710), and Gambia (5,514), said the report.

At various border crossings between Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) IOM staff recorded that more than 3,000 migrants were in the area passing the borders in groups of 50 every 20 minutes in recent days. Fewer than 50% of the migrants and refugees were nationals from Iraq and Syria, most of them families with little children. The rest were mainly nationals from Afghanistan and Pakistan along with some from Sub-Saharan Africa. Many were also speaking Greek, confirming the fact that along with recent arrivals, there were also those who have lived for years in Greece, wanting now to head to Northern and Western Europe.

More than 450,000 migrants have entered Germany so far this year, with a total of at least 800,000 expected for all of 2015.

*[Some 39 migrants, including 4 infants and 11 older children, drowned on their way to Greece in two separate incidents last weekend, reported AP. ]

Civil war displaces 11.6 million Syrians

Syria’s bloody civil war has forced half of the country’s prewar population to flee their homes.

At least 7.6 million Syrians are internally displaced, and an additional 4 million have fled the country, according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). The population at the start of the civil war was 23 million. Countries hosting the largest number of refugees are

Turkey: 1.8 million

Lebanon: 1.1 million

Iraq: 230,000

Egypt: 140,000

Jordan: 600,000 (Jordan insists there are 1.4 million Syrian refugees in the country, a figure equal to 20 percent of the kingdom’s population, said a report.)

In 2013, 9,500 Syrians were displaced per day on average. By July 2014, the total number of internally displaced people (IDPs) reached 6.4 million, a third of the entire population of the country. An additional three million Syrians have sought refuge in neighbouring countries. A stable middle-income country that hosted refugees from all over the region and beyond just four years ago, Syria is now experiencing a displacement and protection crisis of a magnitude the world has not seen for many years. [internal-displacement.org]

“This is the biggest refugee population from a single conflict in a generation,” said UN refugee chief.

A large number of Syrians have been killed in the four-and-a-half year bloody civil war; however, the figures suggested are unreliable.

As of early April, at least 1,213,011 people in Ukraine have registered as IDPs across the country. Some 6,108 have been killed and 15,450 others wounded, according to the Ministry of Social Policy (MoSP).

Total number of Ukrainians who have sought asylum, residence permits or other forms of legal stay in neighboring countries currently stand at 777,355 including 636,544 in Russia and 80,994 in Belarus, reported UNHCR.

Meantime, rapidly increasing food prices has led to lower food consumption, severely affecting the lives of millions in the eastern oblasts of the country, said the report.

Access to social services, especially pension and salaries, remains suspended in the conflict-affected zone.

[The above figures do not include victims from renewed fighting in January and February, said the UN.]

Other highlights of the UN report

At least 1,522 social facilities in need of restoration.

An estimated472 schools have been damaged including at least 10 that have been fully destroyed in non-government controlled areas of Donetsk Oblast. A further eight schools have been closed.

About 2,000 kilometers of water pipelines have been damaged/destroyed, according to Donbas Water Company. [Donbas region in eastern Ukraine comprises of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.]

The escalating conflict in Yemen is taking an intolerable toll on children, as they continue to be killed, injured, displaced and put at increasing risk from disease, UNICEF said in a statement.

At least 74 children are among the 600 killed in Yemen since the fighting began on March 26. Some 44 other children, who have been maimed, are among the 1,700 victims who have been wounded in the past 12 days.

However, these are conservative figures, said UNICEF, adding that it believes the total number of children killed is much higher because the conflict has intensified over the past week.

“Children are paying an intolerable price for this conflict.” said UNICEF Yemen Representative Julien Harneis speaking from the Jordanian capital Amman. “They are being killed, maimed and forced to flee their homes, their health threatened and their education interrupted. These children should be immediately afforded special respect and protection by all parties to the conflict, in line with international humanitarian law.”

An estimated 150,000 people across the war-torn country have fled their homes in search of safety.

Saudi Arabia together with four other Gulf states and Egypt have been conducting airstrikes against the Houthi rebels, who are fighting the “corrupt government” in Yemen.

Meantime, Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan and Sudan (!), have also expressed their willingness to participate in the military operation.

[It’s not yet clear IF/WHEN Burma and Thailand would also join the military operation!!]

What Experts Say: Yemen is on the verge of “total collapse”

“The Sunni versus Shi’a sectarian narrative misrepresents Yemenis’ multiple proclivities for partisan, regional and class-based leadership. If anything, the escalating war pits the billionaire royal elites of the Gulf against the downtrodden of the Peninsula. Bombardments are both terrifying and deadly. Attacks on al-Mazraq camp for internally displaced persons in Hajjah governorate, a dairy factory near Hodeida and other locations have left dozens of non-combatants dead, according to human rights groups. The UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, says ‘the country seems to be on the verge of total collapse,'” said Prof. Sheila Carapico, Dept of Political Science and International Studies, University of Richmond in Virginia.

Gauguin’s “When Will You Marry?” sold for $300 million

An oil painting by Paul Gauguin, the French artist, has been sold to a “Qatari buyer” for about $300 million, said reports.

When Will You Marry? [“Nafea Faa Ipoipo,”] painted in 1892, was owned by a Swiss collector. The sale tops the previous highest price for a painting, a work by Paul Cezanne, which sold for $260m.

When Will You Marry? [“Nafea Faa Ipoipo”] by Paul Gauguin 1892. The image is in the public domain in the U.S.

Carbon Footprint of Your Dollar

To produce a GDP of 77.61 trillion (International Dollars) in 2014, the world economies emitted about 40.33 billion metric tons of CO2 [~ 11 billion tons of carbon.] That is, for every dollar paid (or received), each time, an average of 520 grams of CO2 (142g carbon) was released to the environment!

Based on the above calculations, “When Will You Marry?” has a carbon footprint of about 160,000 metric tons of CO2. [Sources: CASF, MSRB, EDRO, FEWW.]

This amount of pollution is equivalent to Vincent van Gogh driving an economy car 16,000 times around the equator.

76,000 Killed in Syria’s deadliest year yet

Some 76,021 people were killed in the war on Syria last year. A total of 33,278 of the victims were civilians, including 3,501 children, according a UK-based group that calls itself “Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.”

[NOTE: Neither, the group’s credentials and their special interests, if any, nor their figures can be independently verified.]

The total number of casualties since the beginning of the 4-year attempt to destroy Syria is over 190,000, according to the UN figures.

More than 10 million people have been displaced, including 3.3 million who have fled to neighboring countries.

At least 50% of the Syrians live in extreme poverty.

Iraq

Meantime, the Iraqi government has released its figure for the ongoing casualties of George W. Bush’s war on Iraq (episode 2014):

Killed violently: 15,538 people

Wounded: 22,000+

Iraq Body Count (IBC), another UK-based NGO, has released its higher figure of 17,073 civilian deaths.

IBC says the number of civilians killed in Iraq in 2014 doubled from 9,743 in 2013, and almost quadrupled compared to 2012 (recorded violent deaths: 4,622).

However, the IBC figures “do not include combatant deaths, which even by the most cautious tallies have also seen a sharp rise in 2014,” said the group.

“During 2014 Iraq Body Count (IBC) recorded 17,049 civilian deaths from violence. This is the third highest civilian death toll after 2006 and 2007, and some months exceeding even those years’,” said IBC.

Afghanistan

The number of civilians killed and wounded in Afghanistan violence during the first eleven months of this year was 9,617, with 3,188 people killed and 6,429 others wounded, said the UN Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

“Children civilian casualties increased 33 per cent compared to 2013, with casualties among women up 12 per cent […] current projections indicate that 2014 will be the first year that the [reported] civilian casualty count will pass 10,000,” said the UN.

At least 4,634 Afghan police and military personnel were also killed in 2014, and thousands more wounded.

FIRE-EARTH’s population model shows mass die-offs resulting from human impact on the planet and the planetary response to the anthropogenic harm could occur by early 2016.

Collapse of Planetary Life Support Systems Accelerating …

HIoN Index

The FIRE-EARTH/CASF Index of Human Impact on Nature (HIoN), an index for calculating the human impact on the planetary life support systems, climbed to a critically high level of 382 in July, 2014. In other words, the anthropogenic impact on the living environment exceeded 3.82 times the planet’s diminishing carrying capacity.

The index is rising exponentially.

HIoN reached 323 in July 2013 .

HIoN has risen 97 points, or more than 34 percent, since July 2012 when it reached 285.

The index was less than 80 in 1960, and rose to about 100 in 1980.

According to HIoN projections, our cities and population centers could become almost entirely unsustainable by as early as 2015.

Collapse of Planetary Life Support Systems Accelerates

HIoN skyrockets to yet another new high

The FIRE-EARTH/CASF Index of Human Impact on Nature (HIoN), an index for calculating the human impact on the planetary life support systems, climbed to a critically high level of 382 this month. In other words, the anthropogenic impact on the living environment exceeded 3.82 times the planet’s diminishing carrying capacity.

The index is rising exponentially.

HIoN reached 323 in July 2013 .

HIoN has risen 97 points, or more than 34 percent, since July 2012 when it reached 285.

The index was less than 80 in 1960, and rose to about 100 in 1980.

“According to HIoN projections, our cities and population centers could become almost entirely unsustainable by as early as 2015.”

110,000 people flee Ukraine, 54,000 internally displaced: UNHCR

The governor of Russia’s Rostov Region has declared a state of emergency for 40 additional municipal districts in the region amid an influx of refugees from Ukraine, said a report.

“A state of emergency has now been declared across the entire region. The measure is aimed at facilitating the work of temporary accommodation centers and ensuring sustenance for the refugees. In early June, a state of emergency was declared in 15 territories bordering Ukraine.”

“Amid simmering tensions in the Ukrainian east, where violent clashes between pro-Kiev forces and independence supporters continue, thousands of civilians are leaving their homes and seeking shelter in neighboring Russia,” said the report.

As of last week, at least 110,000 people had fled Ukraine to Russia since the beginning of the crisis, and more than 54,000 were internally displaced, according the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR).

Ukraine President Calls Ukrainians “Dirt and Parasites”

“Ukrainian forces struck at pro-Russian separatist bases in eastern regions with air and artillery strikes on Tuesday after President Petro Poroshenko announced he would not renew a ceasefire but go on the offensive to rid Ukraine of ‘[dirt and] parasites,'” Reuters pro-Kiev reporters said.

Detroit Denying Water and Sewerage to ½ Million Citizens

Officials at the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) have cut off service to 7,556 customers in April and May and are now speeding up the service denial to as many as 3,000 delinquent accounts per week.

“That the water department’s shutoff policy is uncompromising, making no exceptions for households with infant children, elderly or disabled residents, said a report.

Detroit!

About 40% of Detroiters live in poverty. Some 83% of population are black, and the reported unemployment rate is edging close to 15%.

“Assisting low-income residents with paying their water bills would help avert a public health crisis,” U.S. Rep. John Conyers (D-Detroit), said in a letter to Obama Thursday, while asking Health and Human Services Secretary to declare a public health emergency, calling the shutoff campaign “draconian.” Said the report.

“Regardless of the rationale for these cutoffs, the human consequences are unacceptable and unsustainable,” said Conyers on Friday.

“Last week, the Detroit City Council approved an 8.7% increase in the water rate, contributing to a total increase of 119% over the last decade,” Conyers said.

“As roughly half the city is now eligible for shutoffs, we believe that immediate action is necessary to stem the consequences of this counterproductive and coldhearted policy,” he said.

“It is utterly unacceptable to put the most vulnerable members of our population through severe hardship, utilizing a method that clearly violates their basic human rights, as a collection practice.”

United Nations

Detroit: Disconnecting water from people who cannot pay – an affront to human rights, say UN experts

“Disconnection of water services because of failure to pay due to lack of means constitutes a violation of the human right to water and other international human rights.”

Exceptional Drought Plagues Third of California

Exceptional Drought spreads to about 33 percent of California, up from 25 percent last week— a jump of 32 percent.

The entire state of California, now in its third year of a catastrophic drought, has been experiencing severe drought or worse for about three months.

“Usually about this time of year we kind of settle into a pattern where it stabilizes and we don’t expect things to change,” said California state climatologist. “But in this case with the severity of the drought we expect to see more impacts come up as the summer progresses.”

Drought, Lowest Rainfall in 6 Decades, Pose Latest Threats to Children in Syria and Region

Many parts of Syria have had their lowest rainfall in nearly 60 years, placing more than 4 million children in the war-torn country at even greater risk, according to UNICEF.

Water scarcity in Syria is now so acute that it may soon force more people to leave their homes, exacerbating the refugee situation. Some 9.3 million people have already been displaced by the conflict.

“In Lebanon and Jordan, meanwhile, tensions between local communities and Syrian refugees are being heightened by competition over limited resources, including dwindling water supplies,” said the report by the UN agency.

“The scarcity of safe water—adding to the impact of the ongoing conflict and the intense summer heat—raises the real risk of more population displacement and the spread of disease among vulnerable children,” said the UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa.

EXTREME RAIN EVENT
SINKHOLE .

Block-long sinkhole swallows cars in Baltimore, MD

The collapse occurred in the Charles Village section of Baltimore on Wednesday afternoon. Several vehicles were swallowed when the street collapsed after two days of rain, said to be the equivalent of a month’s precipitation.

The sinkhole has also been described as a “collapse” and a “landslide.”

WAR OF TERROR ON SYRIA – THIRD ANNIVERSARYMASS EXODUS .

Syria: Tens of thousands slaughtered, more than 9 million displaced

On the third anniversary of war of terror waged by Saudi Arabia and Israel against the Syrian people, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, said: “three years have passed on this horrible Syrian crisis and that means more displaced people to expect. Today we have around 2.6 million Syrians displaced to neighboring countries and more than 6.5 million Syrians displaced inside Syria.”

Guterres expressed his gratitude to the “generosity of the Lebanese and the government of Lebanon,” for hosting most of the displaced Syrian refugees.

He called on the international community to “show more solidarity with Lebanon and provide financial support and share with it the burden because Lebanon cannot be left alone to confront the big challenges in these hard conditions.”

HEGEMONY OVER WORLD’S RESOURCES .

Toying with Russia before grabbing her…

The wars for resources are about the survival of the fattest. They are fought by the urge to secure more of other peoples’ resources: More water, more food, more fertile land and more energy to maintain unsustainable lifestyles. —EDRO

In the most likely scenario, after the first phase of world’s cities has collapsed, an all-out global war would break out that would be fought with nuclear, exotic, biological and conventional weapons:

Officers of Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) loyal to the ousted President Viktor Yanukovich have hacked phones of Estonian Minister of Foreign Affairs Urmas Paet and High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton and leaked their conversation to the web. The officials discuss their impressions of what’s happening in the country after the revolution. The gist of it is that Ukrainian people have no trust in any of the leaders of Maidan [Kiev Independence Square.]

However, the most striking thing of all is the fact which concerns the use of force during the revolution, particularly the snipers who killed both protesters and officers of the riot police. Mr. Paet reveals astonishing information which confirms the rumors that the snipers were employed by the leaders of Maidan.

EXTREME CLIMATIC EVENT
STATE OF EMERGENCY
WORSENING DROUGHT.

The Exceptional Drought Expands

The area covered by Exceptional Drought (D4) in California has expanded by about 12 percent since last week, from 8.77 percent to 9.81 percent of the land.

California is currently experiencing its worst drought on record. In 2013 California experienced its driest year since records began 120 years ago.

California Drought Comparison Map for January 28 and February 4, 2014. Source: U.S. Drought Monitor.

California Drought

Drought persists across California. US Drought Monitor has downgraded Humboldt and Trinity Counties drought conditions from degradation severe to extreme drought (D2 to D3). Areas near Monterey to Bakersfield have been downgraded from extreme to exceptional drought (D3 to D4). Some 8 inches of snow reported on the ground at the Central Sierra Snow Lab near the Donner Summit reports, the lowest for this since at least 1946. Source: NOAA/NWS/NCEP/CPC.

State of Emergency

Governor Brown proclaimed a State of Emergency on January 27 amid the worsening statewide drought. He called the “really serious,” adding that 2014 could be California’s third consecutive dry year. “In many ways it’s a mega-drought.”

57 California Counties Declared Crop Disaster Areas

All but one of the 58 counties in the state of California have been declared Crop Disaster Areas due to Extreme Drought conditions.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has designated 57 counties in the state of California as crop disaster areas due to the worsening drought, since the beginning of the year.

Crop Disaster Map CY-2014 dated January 29, 2014. Source: USDA/FSA

Imperial County, located Southeast of California in the Imperial Valley, bordering both Arizona and Mexico, is currently covered by D0-D1 drought conditions, but has not yet been designated as a drought disaster area.

WE TOLD YOU SO!

57 California Counties Declared Crop Disaster Areas

All but one of the 58 counties in the state of California have been declared Crop Disaster Areas due to Extreme Drought conditions.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has designated 57 counties in the state of California as crop disaster areas due to the worsening drought, since the beginning of the year.

Crop Disaster Map CY-2014 dated January 29, 2014. Source: USDA/FSA

Imperial County, located Southeast of California in the Imperial Valley, bordering both Arizona and Mexico, is currently covered by D0-D1 drought conditions, but has not yet been designated as a drought disaster area.

California is currently experiencing its worst drought on record. In 2013 California experienced its driest year since records began 120 years ago.

State of Emergency

Governor Brown proclaimed a State of Emergency on January 27 amid the worsening statewide drought. He called the “really serious,” adding that 2014 could be California’s third consecutive dry year. “In many ways it’s a mega-drought.”

Nearly 9 percent of California is covered by Exception Drought (D4 drought level), more than 58 percent by Extreme Drought (D3 drought level), about 23 percent by Sever Drought (D2 drought level) and over 9 percent of the state experiencing Abnormally Dry to Moderate Drought conditions as of last week.

The land area covered by Extreme Drought (D3 drought level) has more than doubled since January 7, 2014.

California Drought Map as of January 28, 2014. Source: U.S. Drought Monitor.

‘Extreme’ and ‘Exceptional Drought’ levels are plaguing California, threatening at least 17 communities with water famine.

“Simply put, there’s not enough water in the system right now for customers to expect any water this season from the project,” said the director of California Department of Water Resources (DWR).

DWR is securing what little water remains in the state’s reservoirs in response to the worsening drought and strong likelihood of more severe water shortages in the coming months.

The agency announced Friday that they took actions to conserve the state’s dwindling resources, as a result of which, “everyone—farmers, fish, and people in our cities and towns —will get less water.”

“This historic announcement reflects the severity of California’s drought. After two previous dry years, 2014 is shaping up as the driest in state history,” said DWR.

On Thursday, Sierra snow survey found the snowpack’s statewide water content was only 12 percent of average for this time of year.

Water levels in key reservoirs now are lower than at this time in 1977, one of the two previous driest water years on record.

Lake Oroville in Butte County, the principal SWP reservoir, is at 36 percent of its 3.5 million acre-foot capacity (55 percent of its historical average for the date).

Shasta Lake north of Redding, California’s and the federal Central Valley Project’s (CVP) largest reservoir, is also at 36 percent of its 4.5 million acre-foot capacity (54 percent of average for the date).

San Luis Reservoir, a critical south-of-Delta reservoir for both the SWP and CVP, is just 30 percent of its 2 million acre-foot capacity (39 percent of average for the date).

DWR has never before announced a zero allocation in the 54-year history of the State Water Project to all 29 public water agencies that buy from the SWP. These deliveries help supply water to 25 million Californians and roughly 750,000 acres of irrigated farmland.

The agency forecast in late December that it would be able to deliver only 5 percent of about 4 million acre-feet of State Water Project water requested by the 29 public water agencies that purchase water from the project. They are located in Northern California, the Bay Area, San Joaquin Valley, Central Coast, and Southern California.

WE TOLD YOU SO!

COLLAPSE OF CALIFORNIA LOOMS !

Why the Golden State is so important

California produces about 36 percent of the U.S. vegetables and nearly 70 percent of the country’s fruits and nuts.

The Golden State topped the nation’s agricultural states in cash receipts with $44.7 billion followed by Iowa ($31.9billion), Nebraska ($24.4billion), Texas ($22.7 billion) and Minnesota ($20.5 billion), according to USDA Agricultural Overview for crop year 2012.

California produced more than 350 crop and livestock commodities and was the country’s No. 1 producer of 80 during the 2012 crop year.

1/ California is the sole producer (99 percent or more) of the commodities in bold.2/ Includes tangelos, tangerines and tangors.[Source: USDA, National Agricultural Statistics, Pacific Region, California]

California also produced a total of 23 percent of the nation’s rice, 23 percent potatoes and sweet potatoes, 21 percent of the milk and cream and 6 percent of egg and chicken.

California is currently experiencing its worst drought on record. In 2013 California experienced its driest year since records began 120 years ago.

The severe drought prompted the worst-ever water supply forecast for California: Zero Allocation

“Simply put, there’s not enough water in the system right now for customers to expect any water this season from the project,” said the director of California Department of Water Resources (DWR).

DWR is securing what little water remains in the state’s reservoirs in response to the worsening drought and strong likelihood of more severe water shortages in the coming months.

The agency announced Friday that they took actions to conserve the state’s dwindling resources, as a result of which, “everyone—farmers, fish, and people in our cities and towns —will get less water.”

More than 25 million Californian and 1million acres (404,500 hectares) of farmland get all or most of their drinking and irrigation water from DWR.

Californoa Gov Brown declared a State of Emergency on January 17, describing the drought as being “really serious,” and adding that 2014 could be California’s third consecutive dry year. “In many ways it’s a mega-drought.”

On Friday, Brown said, the zero allocation was a “stark reminder that California’s drought is real.”

“This historic announcement reflects the severity of California’s drought. After two previous dry years, 2014 is shaping up as the driest in state history,” said DWR.

On Thursday, Sierra snow survey found the snowpack’s statewide water content was only 12 percent of average for this time of year.

Water levels in key reservoirs now are lower than at this time in 1977, one of the two previous driest water years on record.

Lake Oroville in Butte County, the principal SWP reservoir, is at 36 percent of its 3.5 million acre-foot capacity (55 percent of its historical average for the date).

Shasta Lake north of Redding, California’s and the federal Central Valley Project’s (CVP) largest reservoir, is also at 36 percent of its 4.5 million acre-foot capacity (54 percent of average for the date).

San Luis Reservoir, a critical south-of-Delta reservoir for both the SWP and CVP, is just 30 percent of its 2 million acre-foot capacity (39 percent of average for the date).

STATEWIDE SUMMARY
Data For: 31-Jan-2014
Number of Stations Reporting: 103
Average snow water equivalent: 2.7″
Percent of April 1 Average: 9%
Percent of normal for this date: 15%

Meanwhile, the severe drought continues to heighten the risk of wild fires.

California experienced catastrophic fires due to extremely dry conditions in 2003 and 2007.

U.S. Drought Monitor

Nearly 9 percent of California is covered by Exception Drought (D4 drought level), more than 58 percent by Extreme Drought (D3 drought level), about 23 percent by Sever Drought (D2 drought level) and over 9 percent of the state experiencing Abnormally Dry to Moderate Drought conditions as of last week.

The land area covered by Extreme Drought (D3 drought level) has more than doubled since January 7, 2014.

California Drought Map as of January 28, 2014. Source: U.S. Drought Monitor.

‘Extreme’ and ‘Exceptional Drought’ levels are plaguing California, threatening at least 17 communities with water famine.

Sectarian violence in CAR continues to escalate

Inter-community clashes in the Central African Republic (CAR) has left at least 600 dead and about 160,000 others displaced, with continuous reports of killings and looting, according to the U.N.

“The number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) continuous to increase as violence persists. There are now over 160,000 IDPs in Bangui gathered in over 40 sites, with the highest concentration in churches, religious sites and the Bangui international airport.”

The following information release in September 2013 illustrates the severity of the situation in CAR